Re: Space travel not war

On Mar 30, 2:43 pm, "Martha Adams" <mh...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I've been thinking since last year's ISDC that
solar power satellites may after all, have a
lot going for them.  The environmental cost of
electric power is becoming a major problem, and
as population expands, people will ignore (for
now) the practical necessity for limiting the
population and they'll keep on wanting more
power (and water, but that's another topic).
So where can this power come from?  This close
in to Sol, there's your source.  Like the
space elevator, this is not a thing you can do
small to test it out, it takes the all-out
kzinti method: scream, and leap.  So it seems
to me, the topic seems to be only, what can
you and I do to make this happen sooner?  

As for the wars, I believe those are pork wars.
It's customary to imagine if there's a war then
we must all rally etc etc; but things have
changed around here and today these wars are
just devices to funnel lots of pork money to a
small number of well-placed military-industrial
people.  Hopefully these pork wars can go away
soon: we cannot afford those even without we
look at the future and make provisions against
what it will bring.  If you compare the several
trillion dollars the recent pork wars are taking
and going to take, vs the scream-and-leap kzinti
approach to getting early solar power stations
up there now, I'd guess even some Republicans
could see which way the difference stands.

So how about if you guys quit blattering at
each other and come up with some *thinking* on
how to make something like solar space
satellites *happen*?  ??

Titeotwawki -- mha   [sci.space.policy 2008
Mar 30]


Microwave based systems with conventional solar panels are heavy and
beams power only at low densities over large areas. Even at the low
power densities microwave levels are far higher than occur naturally,
and the response of biological systems to such high power microwave
beams over long periods is an issue.

Solar pumped laser systems beam energy in the infra-red windows of the
atmosphere that already receive large amounts of energy from the sun.
Infrared energy may be beamed at intensities hundreds of times greater
than microwave system. Infrared free electron lasers powered by
concentrating photovoltaic systems sending band-gap matched energy are
ideally suited for powering pre-existing terrestrial solar power
systems.

My company builds low-cost concentrating photovoltaic systems

http://www.usoal.com

These systems cost 7 cents per peak watt and produce 180 MWp per
square kilometer. Attached to a variable load electrolyzer, and
placed in a locale with 1,600 hours of sunlight per year each square
klometer efficiently produces 5,236 metric tons of hydrogen from
47,128 tons of water each year with 41,888.of oxygen.

20,944 tons of oxygen is combined with 15,708 tons of carbon in 18,480
tons of high rank coal to form 36,652 tons of carbon monoxide. This
carbon monoxide is combined with with the 5,236 tons of hydrogen to
make 41,888 tons of methanol. At $500 per ton this is $20,944,000 per
year per square kilometer. The cost of water is $0.60 per ton in the
US Western States using deep wells, and the cost of coal is $50 per
ton from reserves in Wyoming and Montana. In short nearly $18 million
per year profit can be made from each square kilometer of surface
converted to my solar panels.

The heat of combustion forming the carbon monoxide may also be used to
fire an electrical generatoin system.- generating about 12 gigajoules
thermal per ton of coal burned in this way. So,585 grams per second
is burned in this way per square kilometer.- that's 7 MW thermal per
square kilometer - or - 2.67 MW per sq km conventional electrical.
That's an additional 23,408 MWh of conventional electrical energy
supplied 24/7 per sq km. At $77 per MWh that's an additional $1.8
million per year.

http://www.newmont.com/en/index.asp
http://www.anglogold.com/default.htm

Newmont Mining, and Anglo Ashanti Gold operate large surface mines
near Elko and Carlin Trend Nevada totalling over 12,000 sq km.
According to the 1976 surface reclamation act, they must reclaim their
land and return it to productive use. In 2003 Brightfield Legislation
was passed by Congress, which allows those who use land for renewable
alternative energy to apply for reclamation of their land. This sets
the stage for companies like mine to offer surface reclamation
services for up to $4,000 per acre, or $16 million per sq km.

At 180 MW and $0.09 per peak watt - including all balance of system
costs,my cost is $16.2 million per sq km. Thus, by taking on the
responsibility of land reclamation, i am paid fully to install my
system at a profit. Furthermore, gold mining uses electricity to
electroplate precious metals onto plates which are then cleaned of the
metals. So, these mining operations are also natural uses of the
thermally produced electricity 24/7.

Methanol may be dehydrated to form di-methyl-ether (DME) a diesel fuel
substitute. DME may be dehydrated for form Butane, a highly efficient
fuel. Butane may be polymerized to form Octane, the principal
component of premium gasoline.

Each square kilometer in this way, using the processes described
above, may produce over 200,000 barrels of oil equivalent in liquid
fuels immediately marketed to existing markets for fuels per square
kilometer.

The land now leased by Anglo and Newmont in Nevada alone totalling
12,000 sq km, when developed in this way will produce 32 GW of
continuous electrical power,from coal with ZERO emissions, along with
2.4 billion barrels per year of gasoline, methanol and other fuels.50%
of ALL US imports - 35% of total US use.

The electricity sales to the region, principally Las Vegas, allows the
elimination of carbon emissions in the region, even while coal use
goes up. The liquid fuels are piped over the Union Pacific rights of
way to Oklahoma where they are distributed throughout the United
States.

This is all done WITHOUT solar power satellites.

Now, imagine a large disc 8.2 km in diameter - of 99.8% reflective
only 7.5 microns thick, with 1 micron of aluminum bonded to another
large disc of poly-ethylene-terpthalate (PET) the clear plastic base
of mylar - only 7.5 microns thick. The clear film is bonded
ultrasonically to the underlying mylar film in two concentric rings,
one 8.2 km in diameter and one 8.0 km in diameter. The outer ring is
inflated to 1/500th atm, whilst the inner disk is inflated to
1/1,500th atm.

The thicknesses are averages with the thickness varying slightly so
that tension in the main disk form a parbolic form that forms a spot
80 meters across at 10,000x solar intensity. The system masses 1,460
tons included inflation gases, which can be used to vary focal length
slightly. The system is also equipped with a attitude control system
to place the mirror in a spin once on orbit so that it continually
faces the sun as it orbits the Earth.

The 80 meter diameter spot possesses 68.76 giga-watt of solar energy.
An 80 meter free flying panel with its own ACS intercepts this energy
and converts it with 65% efficiency to DC electrical power. It does
so with very little heating. The system is equipped with a 6 junction
photocell, consisting of a germanium substrate, four gallium arsenide
junctions each uniquely doped, and an indium phosphide junction. The
enter system is faced with a dichroic mirror optical bandpass filter
that efficiently separates out effective and ineffective light (see my
patent on this subject for more details)

http://www.delphion.com/details?pn=US07081584__

The secondary satellite produces 44.7 GW of DC electrical power.

MEMS based high efficiency free electron lasers are built into each of
the multi-junction wafers,that are 70% efficient. - producing over
31.2 GW of laser energy.

The free electron laser array produces light energy that is matched to
efficiently drive the terrestrial solar panels previously described
with nearly 100% efficiency. Only a few percent is lost in
transmission through the atmosphere. The terrestrial system is
silicon based and it has a bandgap energy that peaks at 1,108 nm.
This is the operating frequency of the terrestrial system.

The infrared light passes through a phase conjugate mirror that direct
the main laser energy conjugate to a reference beam reflected off the
solar array on the ground. That is, an 1,108 nm laser light source
illuminates the terrestrial panels in such a way so as to reflect the
beam from the panels, toward the satellite. The satellite's phase
conjugate mirror - using a process called 4-wave mixing - adjusts the
phase of the primary laser beam to follow the pilot beam back to the
terrestrial panels precisely.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonlinear_optics
http://cns-alumni.bu.edu/~slehar/PhaseConjugate/PhaseConjugate.html

Delivering 30 gigawatts of useful eneergy to any array of panels
within sight of the satellite in GEO. The satellite masses a total
503 metric tons. The two systems together 1,963 metrict tons.

The system optics are arranged so that 500 MW of infrared energy
arrive on each square kilometer of terrestrial solar collector. This
is approximately 70% of what the sun produces in the infra-red region
every day so it is not unusual. The energy is nearly 100% absorbed by
the terrestrial collectors.

However, this beam provides power 24/7 - except in the brief times
cloud haze and sand storms interrupt service. Operational times in
Northern Nevada at the 12,000 sq km site previously described 8,700
hours per year - with 66 hours of downtime.

This is a total of 4,350,000 MWh per sq km - enough to inc
The 12,000 sq km produce 6,000 gigawatts of power. Thus, this single
installation described earlier can support 200 satellites each 30
gigawatts net power to the ground.

This is 15.4 times larger than the previous figure - allowing an
increase in output 16.4 times. - sufficient to supply the world's
energy needs from US sources.

This satellite system is launched by a seven element chemical
booster. Each element of this booster is very similar to the space
shuttle external tank - except each element is 89 meters long, 13.3
meter in diameter, and equipped with fold away wings and an advanced
thermal protection system on its nose, along with landing gear, a
propellant cross-feed arrangement, and an annular aerospike engine at
its base. The aerospike engine consists of a number of cryogen pump
sets and injectors from the P&W RS 68 engine - and configured in this
way operates at 430 seconds at sea level and 460 seconds in vacuum.
Six pumpsets comprise each annular engine and produces 6,000,000 kgf
at lift off.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Annular-Aerospike.jpg
..
While the space shuttle external tank masses only 26.6 metric tons and
masses 762.1 metric tons full, the system described here masses 4,000
metric tons full and 240 tons empty - and cost $1.272 billion each.

Seven elements are joined together - when viewed from above they
appear as follows;

(1)(2)
(3)(4)(5)
(6)(7)

This system carries 3,500 tons into LEO, and the central booster,
number 4, has a kick stage carrying additional fuel in it. .

The 2,000 ton payload along with the kick stage is carried in element
four in the intertank space between the oxygen tank and the hydrogen
tank. The stretched element carries the inflatable concentrator along
with the folded away solar collector array and laser system.

At launch all seven engines fire producing 42,000,000 kgf - lifting
the 30,000,000 kg vehicle from the pad, element 1 and 6 feed element
3, element 2 and 7 feed element 5, elements 3 and 5 feed 4. In this
way, elements 1,2,6,7 are drained while all engines fire. This is the
first stage.

Downrange, the four drained elements separate, and 3 and 5 feed 4,
draining them as stage two. The first four elements re-enter down
range, slow to subsonic speed, and are then recovered by a tow plane
which brings the system back to the launch center for reuse.
Meanwhile the second stage, elements 3 and 5 accelerate the vehicle
toward orbit, and separate, collected downrange at their re-entry
point. Element 4 continues to its release point and ejects the kick
stage and payload from the inter-tank space. The kick stage fires
entering a Geosynchrounous Transfer Orbit. Element 4 re-enters near
the launch point, and is collected as the other stages. The kick
stage takes nearly a day to reach geosynchronous orbit. There, it
fires again circularizing the orbit, and the satellite deploys at the
desired location. The kick stage provides video of this event, and
deorbits, recovered in a manner similar to the other elements - and is
reused. Depending on the complexity, this may be a manned system,
alternatively a teleoperated system may work as well.

At $11 billion per vehicle, and with 1,000 flight capability, along
with a 3 day turn around, 100 flights per year are possible with this
vehicle. - and a single vehicle may put up the entire collection of
200 in 2 years. An additoinal $4 billion for ground infrastructure,
the $15 billion system, along with the $2.5 billion per year operating
cost - has $20 billion to lanch the 200 satellites - $100 million
each. The concentrator satellite has a cost of $410 million. The
solar powered laser satellite has a cost of $2.7 billion. - a total
of $3 billion per system, to produce 30 billion watts from an existing
terrestrial solar unit. This is a cost of $0.10 per watt - but unlike
a solar system that operates only 1,600 hours per year, this unit
operates 8,700 hours per year - so, is 5x more valuable!!!

The deployment of one satellite and its successful operation, will
allow large scale investment banking financing of all subsequent
satellites. The $600 billion price tag for the 200 satellites is a
bargain compared to the $4,000 billion per year in fuels. Since fuel
demand is growing in China and India at 10% per annum rates, the
system described here will need to be augmented well before
completion.

In the end the USA could supply a mix of sunfuels, and hydrogen to the
world at rates that reflect per capita energy usage world wide equal
to that of the USA today. This would give the USA a great strategic
advantage going forward, and strengthen out economy.

Beyond beaming laser energy to power terrestrial solar panels, as
skill levels grow, beaming of high intensity lasers to laser powered
rockets and jets, and directly to end users, world wide,would
transition from a hydrogen economy, to a laser energy economy.

Ultimately, the 80 m diamter high intensity satellite, may be operated
within 3 million kilometers of the sun, eliminating the need for a
concentrator, with energy beamed interplanetary distances to reforming
satellites that distribute the power to users as needed.

Bob Forward back in the 1980s worked out ways to beam laser energy
interstellar distances to propel starships on interstellar voyages.
These techniques are easily adapted to provide power and propulsion in
interplanetary space, and to terrestrial users on the ground.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_propulsion


.

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